B-W School Officials Won't Enforce New Eligibility Policy (Yet)

Upon further review, the 's Policy 122, which requires students in extracurricular activities to maintain a C grade level in all four core subjects, will not be enforced until the start of the 2012-13 school year at the earliest.

Baldwin-Whitehall School Board President John B. Schmotzer cited confusion over the policy's language, specifically regarding its similarity—or, more suitably, lack thereof—to a Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association (PIAA) policy, as reason for delaying enforcement.

The PIAA's eligibility policy—only for student-athletes—allows a student to participate in sports as long as he or she has passing grades in any four full-credit subjects, but Baldwin-Whitehall's stricter policy (if enforced) would require students to maintain a 70-percent minimum in English, social studies, math and science. And it would apply not only to student-athletes in grades 7-12 but also to any student in those grades who wishes to participate in other activities, such as German Club, student newspaper, et al.

B-W's student-athletes will have to continue to comply with the PIAA's eligibility policy in the meantime, Schmotzer said, as for now, those students will not be held to a higher standard.

"We want to make sure that the athletic eligibility policy and the extracurricular activity policy mirror each other," he said. "We don't want one to be any different than the other ...

"Come a new school year, we will have both policies ready to be implemented with revisions that administration's working on."

Fellow school board member George L. Pry, who was the president of the board when it , said that clarifying what is meant by "passing" as compared to "70 percent" should also be a priority.

"The question is 'What's passing?'" Pry said. "Is passing '70'? Is 'D' (60 percent) passing?"

Pry also confirmed Schmotzer's comment that Policy 122 is confusing to members of the school district, even to administrators.

"It was always my understanding that the policy that we were looking at was the applied policy of the state for athletics and that we were just passing that policy along to the (other) extracurricular (activities)," he said. "And it seems to me that we have taken it a step higher than that, which is fine, but I think that there should be a debate on that.

"I'm not for lowering standards, but I want to have an equal playing field ... So I am fully supportive of waiting until we get our arms wrapped around this."

As for how a revised Policy 122 will look next school year, check back with the Baldwin-Whitehall Patch for updates.

And check back with the Baldwin-Whitehall Patch later on Thursday for more odds and ends from Wednesday night's school board meeting.

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